News from Around the World

The Robert Blake trial is moving along nicely.

The Segway transition took me a second to get. I was still laughing from the Robert Blake stuff—“…knocking off his cat”…hehehe, it’s STILL funny.

‘A FLIGHT attendant who has undermined prosecution claims that Michael Jackson served alcohol to his accuser during a plane trip testified yesterday that the boy was unruly, rude and started a food fight.

Following News of Michael Jackson's Trial

What's one of the surest signs that China is aspiring for greater status and power? Meddling in African politics, of course:

China is increasingly making its presence felt on the continent - from building roads in Kenya and Rwanda to increasing trade with Uganda and South Africa. But critics say its involvement in politics could help prop up questionable regimes, like Mr. Mugabe's increasingly autocratic 25-year reign.

The promise of tax relief has reemerged as a dominant theme in Virginia politics as the likely candidates for governor, Democrat Timothy M. Kaine and Republican Jerry W. Kilgore, begin touring the state with competing plans to ease levies on homeowners.

The defence in the trial of Michael Jackson have been dealt a severe blow with the news that the mother of the boy he is alleged to have abused refused money from a mystery millionaire.

Following News of Michael Jackson's Trial

...John Kerry's assets exceed the total assets of all 51 republican senators combined by a very significant margin (35%). Repeat...all 51 republican Senators combined.

Following News of Michael Jackson's Trial

Rumours have suggested the 16-year-old’s record label Sony BMG may be about to drop her from their roster and its certainly been evident of late the label has been focusing its efforts on promoting Idol runner-up Anthony Callea, who has admittedly sold more records than Donovan.

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The fact the label didn’t even bother to send out a press release to announce, what is in effect, Donovan’s first solo Sydney show would appear to support the rumours.

With her second single languishing on the charts at No.32 after failing to reach higher than 18, it remains to be seen whether Sony BMG will even release a third single from here album For You.

Remember the story of Sandy Bergler and the missing classified documents? Well, he finally plead guilty to stealing the classified documents. But he and his fans can't seem to comprehend why we have laws in this country. When the news broke, Bill Clinton, the man who hired this guy to be National Security Advisor laughed....

Less than 24 hours ago, a new episode of Saturday Night Live concluded after featuring three notable satirical sketches about the 2004 Presidential Campaign. The show began with a spoof of the bin Laden tape, in which actor Seth Meyers depicted the terrorist, and a “translator” had his comments captioned as subtitles on the screen. The translation of bin Laden's comments included a general analysis of the election and: “2 representatives campaigning for Kerry dragged me to Cincinnati and registered me to vote...How is Kerry going to pay for healthcare after what my organization did to the US economy?...The candidates are not that different, although I cannot stand Teresa Heinz Kerry...I am undecided...Land of the Free, all men are created equal, and especially, Live from NY, it's Saturday night!” The show continued with a cartoon in which Sen. John McCain prepared for a speech, drank alcoholic beverages, banged his head, broke a mirror, interrupted himself several times during the actual speech performance, entered the Bush-Cheney '04 campaign trailer, fell over bleeding after dancing to the Doors' “This is the End,” and finished the speech without a shirt on, saying, “This is harder than I thought.” President Bush also paused during his speech for verbal cues. Finally, the political portion of the 10/30/2004 SNL episode concluded with a skit featuring Darrell Hammond as Bill Clinton, Seth Meyers as John Kerry, Maya Rudolph as Teresa Heinz Kerry, and other actors as people campaigning for Kerry. In the sketch, Teresa Heinz Kerry told John: “You look the same no matter how you feel,” while Clinton was coaching Kerry on how to approach the campaign and told him to say: “Ladies and gentlemen, I am proud to present President Bill Clinton.”

Such developments have begun to sway some of Borlaug’s opposition. The Committee on Sustainable Agriculture, a coalition of environmental and development-oriented groups, has become somewhat open to fertilizer use in Africa. “The environmental movement went through a phase of revulsion against any chemical use in agriculture,” says Robert Blake, the committee’s chairman. “People are coming to realize that is just not realistic. Norman has been right about this all along.” One reason the ground is shifting back...

In the evening we went out for dinner to a local brewery with the available speakers and organizers. Afterwards, some of the speakers (including me) went to a bar we got recommended from the organizers, named "electric ass" (freely translated). Also the name created some confusion (especially for our female guests), the place was really great. The music was pretty much my style (more or less rock and crossover), and I made a very funny experience: Imagine, you are coming from Germany, you're sitting in a bar in Canada and they start playing...

There were also boxes of books. In one, I found a book with a rather off-putting title, seemingly about politics, in which I had no interest: “The Story of A Secret State” by Jan Karski.

I'm no expert on Palestinean politics, but if legit, this would strike me as a rather big deal. As for the obvious stumbling block -- Hamas rejecting the existence of Israel, the PLO accepting it -- Zahar said, "we are renouncing not one iota of Palestinian land but we can reach a temporary compromise with other factions."

The problem here is the politics of SB 217. Conceivably the Senate leadership could usher this bill through quickly and declare that they have �fixed� the Medical Lawsuit issue.

‘Lisa Marie Presley aired her “Dirty Laundry” on “Oprah.” In the first of a two-part interview on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” to promote her new album, Presley spoke Monday about her brief marriage to Michael Jackson, who is on trial in Santa Maria, Calif., on child molestation charges.

Following News of Michael Jackson's Trial

‘Jurors in the Michael Jackson trial have heard evidence from the organiser of a comedy camp for underprivileged youth who introduced the superstar’s accuser, Gavin Arviso, to celebrities while the boy was being treated for cancer.

Following News of Michael Jackson's Trial

I’m tired, so I’m going to just go ahead and say that George W. Bush has defeated John Kerry. If I have to eat crow in the morning, or Thursday, or whenever the Democrats get done whining in court, I will… Off to bed for me.

I wouldn't have said so two weeks ago. But I've seen enough of these dramas unfold to know when I'm watching a new one, and now I am. You know the story line, which dates back to the Greeks: a powerful, hubristic leader is brought low by his own flaws. Think Jim Wright, Newt Gingrich, Bill Clinton.

James P. Rubin, Staatssekretär unter Bill Clinton, erklärt in der WELT, warum Paul Wolfowitz einen exzellenten Chef der Weltbank abgeben wird.

I don't think it's a matter of rhetoric alone; using a power/social roles framework rather than an identity framework also lets us escape traps from conservatives who pretend that treating people decently is somehow giving "minorities" "special rights" that everyone else doesn't have when we see that those steps are in place to protect the disempowered. It keeps people like one idiot I knew who was of White South African ancestry from claiming to be "African American." And it lets us effectively critique the claim that privileged minorities like...

Note: I’ve posted again a very sad posting that Mr. Stephen Kinsella had put on a rather catty web site that antiwar.com has created to post attacks on me. In any case, after I linked to it, they took it down and oddly replaced it with a colorful bit of revisionist (i.e., completely made up) history by Justin Raimondo. So here’s Mr. Kinsella’s defense of Lew Rockwell’s truly nutty belief that the black mayor of San Francisco called Condoleeza Rice before...

Finally, I should direct anyone who's interested in the matter to a remarkably sad comment by Mr. Kinsella, Lew Rockwell's most eager defender, at a little web site that they set up just to blog about me: http://ancapistan.typepad.com/the_palmer_periscope/2005/01/palmer_on_insan.html . It was in response to my blog entry on "Insanity" (http://www.tomgpalmer.com/archives/018243.php...

The President, Condoleeza Rice, and Dick Cheney are flying on Air Force One.

Gov. Rick Perry and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison are exchanging barbs over each other’s praise of former First Lady Hillary Clinton.

Monticello, of course, was the home of Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence. That document (as well as the U.S. Constitution, later) was signed in Independence Hall. The Statue of Liberty memorializes the free nation under God that those founding documents created.

As former US President Bill Clinton had said, it all depends on what is the meaning of the word "is".

MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, who narrowly lost presidential polls in 2002, did not respond to Mugabe's comments during speeches Tuesday at two rallies in his home region of Bindura, 125 miles south of the capital.

"She said that you have made this court like O.J.'s court or Robert Blake's court, and you lied and changed the words around," Masada said.

Sound at all familiar? After consecutive losses in three congressional and two presidential campaigns, more than a few Democrats still take comfort from the fact that a switch of just 60,000 Ohio votes could have put John Kerry in the White House.

At one point, the boy told Masada that Michael Jackson was his "idol" and wanted to know if he could arrange a meeting. Masada made several phone calls, never reaching Jackson himself. Word got to Jackson, however, and the singer called the boy personally at the hospital in August 2000.

Lee Kuan-yew, the founding father of Singapore, advised people in Hong Kong on Wednesday to stay away from politics and stick to business, saying Beijing has no intention of allowing greater democracy in the territory.

Vang, president of Lao Human Rights Council, and other Hmong leaders here and nationwide have organized a petition drive and letter-writing campaign to President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, urging them to pressure Laos and Vietnam to end the genocide of Hmong tribes or help take them out of the country.

Again, it is not about politics, or religion, or the Extreme Right and The Left always hating them and vice versa.

Update: Apparantly Ogre at Ogre's Politics and Views had the same idea as I did but just a few minutes apart..... hmmmmm? Great Minds Think Alike? (yes, that was cajolery)

Mitofsky, Warren J. and Murray Edelman. 1995. "A Review of the 1992 VRS Exit Polls." Presidential Polls and the News Media. Eds. P. J. Lavrakas, M.W. Traugott, and P.V. Miller. Pp. 81-100. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.

"I have to say I'm more surprised than Robert Blake's attorneys."

So based on that exposure, which is very similar to what a lot of American's have, what are the issues of the last two weeks? Schiavo, steroids, social security (though no info here, just that Bush continues his campaign). And, oh yeah, some soldiers and Iraqis died in the war. Some soldiers came home to Oregon. Robert Blake was found innocent, Michael Jackson was sick and went to court in pajamas, and Scott Peterson got a death sentence. And that's it.

If you follow these rules, you'll certainly do fine as an attorney. But every once in a while (not all the time, or you might go bankrupt), you might want to consider throwing these rules aside and just going with your gut. That's what Gerald Schwartzbach, the attorney who just won Robert Blake's acquittal must have done. Though as described here, Schwartzbach was Blake's fourth attorney, the two hit it off. And Schwartzbach's risk has likely paid off because...

Get it? The point being made by both Kristof and Yglesias is about the political currency of validation. America has been a fundamentally majoritarian nation since its inception, and hopefully with the exception of the Senate, it’s likely to stay that way. We’re used to it. Americans have learned to live with being on the losing side of a given vote, election, or national dialogue. What they have not learned to live with, and probably never will, are political leaders who, in seeking to justify their decisions, simply refuse to recognize...

In previous decades, famous ads were candidate ads—Johnson’s “Daisy” ad in 1964, Bush’s “Revolving Door” ad in 1988, and Reagan’s “Bear in the Woods” ad in 1984. However, today’s advertisements are broadcast not only by candidates, but also by parties, groups, and individuals. For example, the Sierra Club ran spots attacking the environmental record of Texas Governor George W. Bush and even a private individual in 2000 (Sam Wylie of Texas) spent a million dollars on ads attacking Senator John McCain.

David at GreenCine points to Patrick Walsh's insightful discussion of teaching Western films in Germany. Walsh's stated intention was to use the Western to "guide [his] students toward a consideration of American manhood," but students instead identified the Western with George W. Bush's "cowboy" persona and instead used the course to think about "American self-sanctioned violence."

The decadent buffoon Bill Clinton sent armed agents from the INS to seize a small boy from an American family – despite rulings by the majestic and infallible Florida courts granting custody of the boy to that very family.

Suffering from “O.J. Syndrome,” the now unemployable actor Robert Blake seems to be working undercover for the LAPD Vice Squad—fulfilling a lifelong dream to work as he acted in law enforcement.

Of course, it was a COMPLETELY different matter LAST week, when Condoleeza Rice berated the EC for suggesting that the emarbargo on the sale of arms to China be lifted. After all, as Rice said:

I just read the very interesting interview the Washington Post did with Condoleeza Rice. There are three issues I want to highlight in it, but I’ll post each separately. The first is about Egypt. For about a quarter century, the primary objective of the Mubarak regime and its most important claim to both international and domestic legitimacy has been that it has delivered stability. Stability is Mubarak’s mantra and his raison d’etre. For a long time, that was one of the main reason Egypt was an important US ally. For a while now there has been a lot of talk about how the neo-con plan for the Middle East changes all that, but it hadn’t really been applied towards Cairo. I wonder if that is beginning to change:

But then, of course. China goes ahead and makes the anti-secession law….and passes it with a rubber stamp vote from its Peoples Congress. I am happy to see that Europe finally has the sense to see President Bush’s viewpoint that China is an emerging threat to the stability of east Asia. And kudos for Condoleeza Rice for putting up a solid face of this viewpoint on her recent trip to the Far East. Reports put the march in Taipei at between 500k and 1 million people. Given that the population of Taiwan is just 23 million…it is indeed a spectacular showing of people power.

The famous "facts on the ground" continue to be unilaterally massaged by the Zionist state as it attempts to cut losses and consolidate 'keepers'. The premise is that in the end game, the only facts that matter will be the 'facts on the ground' and the ability to defend them politically and, perhaps, physically. The year-long duplicity remained largely unchallenged till the US was challenged to clarify its position last month. That 'clarification' has become very muddled with Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice currently denying any disagreement with Israel over Jewish settlements out of one side of her mouth while asserting US commitment to the terms of the road map out of the other - obvious double-speak on Iseraeli Public Radio Sunday:

Now, the big question is who should replace him? Its been rumored that Bill Clinton would very much be interested in the post. I’m not so sure that, depending on who else is in the running for the post, I wouldn’t be in favor of such a thing.

Financial numbers of all kinds annually reach "record" levels until inflation and buying power are taken into account. At the end of Bill Clinton's second term, the defense budget was at a "record" level, but adjusted for inflation was nearly 50 percent lower than the peak Ronald Reagan budget. If Social Security payments were not indexed for inflation, they would still set a "record" every year while annually declining in real value. Etc. It's an embarrassment to journalism when big news organizations act as if they don't know about real-dollar valuation. ATSRTWT (Note that this was a year ago; as my dad used to say: palooka change)

The report that President Bush had cut short his weekend ranch getaway to rush back to Washington to sign brain-damage legislation may have disappointed many Americans, but it was, no doubt, news that was greeted with joy by this country’s comedians. For this is satire served them on a silver platter. George Bush's defending the brain dead is too good to be true. It's Dan Quayle judging a spelling bee; Bill Clinton teaching at a girl’s school; Jesse Jackson advising job-hunters; Janet Reno giving beauty tips; OJ Simpson coaching anger management. At a time when many citizens are questioning the President’s pandering to the Religious Right, I’m starting to wonder if he isn’t getting kickbacks from the writers at Saturday Night Live.

Dick Morris, Bill Clinton's former poll-meister, has this on Hillary's move to the center. As before, keep in mind where she really stands.

I could go on. But for Gier to look to Robbins and Gerety for guidance in an intramural Reformed theology debate over the nature of the Covenant is like looking to Bill Clinton for lessons in marital faithfulness.

Although Post reporter Mike Allen obtained the memo from an "unimpeachable" source, he denies that source was former President Bill Clinton, who survived an impeachment attempt.

john refuese to vote to impeach bill clinton and communist for john kerry .com john join commist jane fonda in prottest the warr and john voted to cut every law enforcement c.i.a. and defense thank you.

For example, here's one trail: The Life Legal Defense Foundation, an anti-abortion organization, has spent over $300,000 on Schindlers' lawyers. Their support comes largely from the Alliance Defense Fund, which receives money from conservative foundations which are part of the Philanthropy Roundtable, such as the Bradley Foundation. The Family Research Council, which filed a pro-Bush amicus brief, also received bucks from the Bradley group. A coalition of disability organizations, who have been very vocal, also get money from Roundtable members like the Scaife Family Foundation, which largely funded the merciless persecution of Bill Clinton.

The Democratic Party has been pro-trade since Franklin Roosevelt, and President Bill Clinton in particular tugged the party to embrace the realities of trade. Now the party may be retreating toward protectionism under the guise of labor standards.

As I think about this, I’m reminded of something Bill Clinton once said about debt releif: No one talks about it, because no one will lose an election for not talking about it. This seems to be kind of the same issue. Hard as I try, I can’t locate a domestic political constituency that would united behind an issue like this. This is a fundamental weakness of Bush’s global-democratization strategy: The sacrifices we’d have to make for it to work, in terms of setting a moral example for the world, benefit other nations but get voted on by us. This is not to say that Americans are too selfish to vote for someone else’s wellbeing. The problem is that they don’t know whether something is beneficial to someone else&rsquo